The Investor’s Guide to Inflation
The top articles on inflation curated by our co-founder.
Blockworks has curated a collection of the latest articles and research on inflation. Read on and scroll to the bottom for a complete list of our Investor’s Guides.
Articles
The Ultimate Guide to Inflation
Lyn Alden, Lyn Alden Investment Strategy
Inflation is a controversial and complex topic. This article looks at 150 years of data across multiple countries to provide a general idea of what inflation is, what to look for, and how to invest with inflationary and deflationary risks in mind. …
These 3 Policy Failures Are Killing the American Dream
Eric Levitz, Intelligencer, Square, October 7, 2019
The United States has never been richer. In 2018, American households boasted a collective net worth of over $98 trillion. If that wealth were divided evenly across the U.S. population, every human being in our country would have roughly $298,000 to their name — and every family of four would be millionaires. …
Books
Talking to My Daughter About the Economy: or, How Capitalism Works – and How It Fails
Yanis Varoufakis, Jacob Moe (Translator), Farrar, Straus and Giroux, May 18, 2018
In Talking to My Daughter About the Economy, activist Yanis Varoufakis, Greece’s former finance minister and the author of the international bestseller Adults in the Room, pens a series of letters to his young daughter, educating her about the business, politics, and corruption of world economics. …
When Money Dies: The Nightmare of Deficit Spending, Devaluation, and Hyperinflation in Weimar Germany
Adam Fergusson, PublicAffairs, October 12, 2010
When Money Dies is the classic history of what happens when a nation’s currency depreciates beyond recovery. In 1923, with its currency effectively worthless (the exchange rate in December of that year was one dollar to 4,200,000,000,000 marks), the German republic was all but reduced to a barter economy. Expensive cigars, artworks, and jewels were routinely exchanged for staples such as bread; a cinema ticket could be bought for a lump of coal; and a bottle of paraffin for a silk shirt. People watched helplessly as their life savings disappeared and their loved ones starved. Germany’s finances descended into chaos, with severe social unrest in its wake.Money may no longer be physically printed and distributed in the voluminous quantities of 1923. However, “quantitative easing,” that modern euphemism for surreptitious deficit financing in an electronic era, can no less become an assault on monetary discipline. Whatever the reason for a country’s deficit — necessity or profligacy, unwillingness to tax or blindness to expenditure — it is beguiling to suppose that if the day of reckoning is postponed economic recovery will come in time to prevent higher unemployment or deeper recession. What if it does not? Germany in 1923 provides a vivid, compelling, sobering moral tale. …
The Price of Tomorrow: Why Deflation is the Key to an Abundant Future
Jeff Booth, Stanley Press, January 14, 2020
We live in an extraordinary time. Technological advances are happening at a rate faster than our ability to understand them, and in a world that moves faster than we can imagine, we cannot afford to stand still. These advances bring efficiency and abundance—and they are profoundly deflationary. Our economic systems were built for a pre-technology era when labour and capital were inextricably linked, an era that counted on growth and inflation, an era where we made money from inefficiency. That era is over, but we keep on pretending that those economic systems still work. The only thing driving growth in the world today is easy credit, which is being created at a pace that is hard to comprehend—and with it, debt that we will never be able to pay back. As we try to artificially drive an economic system built for the past, we are creating more than just economic trouble. On our current path, our world will become profoundly more polarized and unsafe. We need to build a new framework for our local and global economies, and soon; we need to accept deflation and embrace the abundance it can bring. Otherwise, the same technology that has the power to bring abundance to us and our world will instead destroy it. In this extraordinary contrarian book, Jeff Booth, a leading mind and CEO in e-commerce and technology for 20 years, details the technological and economic realities shaping our present and our future, and the choices we face as we go forward—a potentially alarming, but deeply hopeful situation. …
What Has Government Done to Our Money?
Murray N. Rothbard, Ludwig von Mises Institute, May 27, 2015
What Has Government Done to Our Money? details the history of money, from early barter systems, to the gold standard, to present-day systems of paper money. Rothbard explains how money was originally developed, and why gold was chosen as the preferred commodity to use as money. The author also explains how the gold standard makes money a commodity, and how market forces create a stable economy. Rothbard shows that many European governments went bankrupt due to World War I and left the gold standard in order to try to solve their financial issues, which was not the right solution. He also argues that this strategy was partially responsible for World War II and led to economic problems throughout the world. …
Podcasts and Videos
The Grant Williams Podcast, The End Game – Episode 5
The End Game – Episode 5: Russell Napier, Apple Podcasts, August 2, 2020
Bill and Grant welcome Russell Napier to The End Game to discuss the reasons behind the long-term disinflationist’s recent decision to step off that train and prepare for the return of inflation.
Using examples from the 1690s, 1930s and 1970s, Russell makes the case for inflation in the United States hitting 4% before the end of the year and explains why recent moves by the U.S. government to circumvent the Federal Reserve have changed the game dramatically and, potentially, bring The End Game much closer. …
Inflation is theft
Lex Clips, Robert Breedlove and Lex Fridman, YouTube, April 19, 2021
Robert Breedlove is a decentralized finance entrepreneur, philosopher, and podcaster.
What is Inflation
Preston Pysh (We Study Billionaires), YouTube, May 12, 2012
By understanding what causes inflation, we can then understand how it destroys the yield of a loan and maintains the value of corporate ownership. We learned that inflation is generally caused when the government increases the supply of money in the financial system. When this occurs, members of the system have more money to spend and the price of goods and services go up. This increase in price can drastically destroy a long term investment if the investor doesn’t account for the compounding inflation rate. …
The Connection between Inflation and Bitcoin
On the Margin, Michael Ippolito and Lyn Alden, Blockworks, YouTube, March 17, 2021
On this episode of On The Margin, we discuss the transition of monetary to fiscal dominance, Lyn’s thoughts on inflation, the implications of a steepening yield curve, what she would do as chairman of the Federal Reserve, and her thoughts on the growing digital asset ecosystem.
Lacy Hunt: The Road Through Deflation Toward Eventual Hyperinflation
Macro Voices, Erik Townsend, Patrick Ceresna, Dr. Lacy Hunt, YouTube, April 30, 2020
MacroVoices Erik Townsend and Patrick Ceresna welcome Dr. Lacy Hunt to the show to discuss his core thesis on interest rates and inflation, how to interpret FED policy in inflation and perspectives on the FED bailing out the high yield market.
Jeff Booth on the Link Between Inflation and Inequality
On the Margin, Michael Ippolito and Jeff Booth, Blockworks, YouTube, April 14, 2021
Jeff’s main observation is as simple as it is profound: we live in a deflationary world that depends on inflation for economic growth. How can we reconcile those two ideas? In short, we can’t. In this episode we covered the powerful deflationary impacts of deflation, the inflationary structure of our current monetary system, how government meddling is leading to inequality, and how Bitcoin may lead us to a brighter future. …
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